The Chadband Family

Henry and Mary Louise Chadband and their children, Charles Dudley, Elsie, Ethel, Harry, Louise, Harold, Ben, Winifred, Nellie, Doll and Evelyn, about 1900.

John Rowley in the bakehouse of the Pork Shop before it closed, with some of the Chadband equipment

The former Chadband shop, in 1970. Photo Warwickshire County Records Office.

The Chadbands held one of the longest tenures of the gardens, but their tenure of the premises which we know as the Pork Shop was almost twice as long. The shop and the gardens were to become pretty closely entwined.

We first encounter Thomas Chadband in 1794, when he was living in the house which became 12 Swan Street. It belonged to the charity of Matthew Busby, being the place where he himself had lived before his death in 1723. Busby called himself a gentleman, but he was probably a publican, for the house was called the Peacock. Later, it was the Dolphin, and by Thomas Chadband's time it was the White Hart. Thomas may already have been there some time, since we have no information of the house for the previous twenty years. Of Thomas's children, we only know of Robert, who, after starting his married life in his wife's home town of Kenilworth, was the proprietor of the White Hart by the birth of his son Henry in 1816. In the end, the couple had produced a string of eleven children, though two of these died as infants.

Robert's mother died in 1818, leaving Robert and his wife Anne to raise their growing family in the White Hart. Robert himself died at only 46 in 1830, after which his widow ran the pub supported by three of her grown-up children. The daughter, Mary, who never married, doubtless helped her mother throughout. Robert was a cooper, but Benjamin had started to move in the direction of provisioning, and in 1841 called himself a poulterer. The family later claimed that their business dated from 1828, so perhaps part of the premises had been used for that purpose for some time.

Ten years later, Robert, Benjamin and Mary were still living at the White Hart with their mother, and there was now no reference to its being a pub. The following year, Benjamin, now living in Linen Street, and calling himself sometimes a grazier, and others a farmer, married , and later moved to Smith Street where he set up in business as a grocer and provision dealer.

Anne died in 1867, at the age of 84. By that time another son, George, earlier a hatter, was assisting in the poultry business, and Mary had developed the confectionery side. Benjamin had already moved with his wife and small family into the house, which was still often known as the White Hart, and advertised his business as a provision dealer or a grocer. The business was prospering, and in 1873 Benjamin negotiated with the charity trustees the purchase of the property for £375. It consisted of five bedrooms, two sitting rooms, on atthe back, one at the front, Downstairs, there was a small shop in front and a dairy or larder behind and there were two good cellars, with a small garden in the rear. He almost immediately embarked on some improvements to his house, which had almost doubled in value a year later, but had reduced the size of the garden.

In 1870, Benjamin took a lease of Plot 23 at Hill Close. The garden inventory lists a Summer arbour, pig sty, wash tub, cucumber lights, and brick frame, 2 asparagus beds, 1 filbert tree, 2 standard rose trees, 4 standard plum trees, 3 standard apple trees, 2 espalier ditto, 1 standard cherry tree, 29 gooseberry trees, 32 currant trees, 2 strawberry beds. All walks edged with tiles, gates and locks thereunto, water tub, quick hedge, 1 row sea kale, herbs. This is the most comprehensive list of planting which we have for any of the gardens and gives us a real flavour of the way in which these plots were laid out. It could be that the pork pies and meat which were to figure prominently in the business of his son, had been a part of it from Benjamin's time as a grazier, but it could be that the pig stye on the garden led to a development in this direction.

Three years later, Benjamin bought his garden, and it remained associated with the family until 1958.

In 1878, Benjamin's son, Henry, married, and they moved into the shop in Swan Street. Benjamin went into retirement in Milverton, leaving room for the rapidly expanding family. More changes to the house were made, perhaps to accommodate them all. Henry and his wife Mary Louise ultimately had thirteen children, of whom only two died in infancy. The house was a large one, but the living accommodation was all on the upstairs,  They would generally have been sharing the premises with a servant and a shop assistant too.

Henry leased a large walled garden behind one of the other shops in Swan Street, and the photograph here was taken there, but he continued to use the one in Hill Close, and perhaps increased the number of pig sties there. During a financially tight period he sold the garden to his neighbour, John Lloyd Evans, the proprietor of the Warwick Advertiser, but he remained its tenant.

In 1917, Henry died and the business was bought from the estate by his son Charles Dudley. Two years later he bought back the garden from Lloyd Evans. In his time the garden is remembered as being largely fruit trees in grass; apples and pears were picked at Mop time and stored in a building in Castle Lane; quinces were collected from the tree next to the summerhouse, and taken to Burgess and Colbourne to sell in their specialist greengrocery.

Charles Dudley sold the shop on his retirement, but it continued in use as a pork shop, still with a baker's next door. The pork pies are still made with the moulds used a century ago.